The European Commission’s vaccine purchase fiasco carries a huge potential for negative consequences, while at the same time, much points to the “Brussels bubble” not being fully aware of those consequences.
The idea of a joint purchase and distribution of vaccines was a good one — mostly because it gave hope of avoiding a situation in which access to vaccines and citizens’ security would become the subject of antagonistic competition between member states. Yet, the fulfillment of this idea turned into a true catastrophe which revealed the well-known bureaucratic flaws in the EU’s functioning.
Most of all, it poses the even more important question of whether the EU is able to ensure common security and whether we can trust it on this issue going into the future.
This is why the vaccine fiasco will have serious influence over how the EU is perceived when it comes to European security. As an example, the belief that the EU ensures efficient, joint defense against traditional military threats will become even more preposterous to many.
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